The final level of Map 5 is straight-up devious. This one pulls out some of the most annoying tactics in Crash Bandicoot 4 to make sure you don’t collect all the crates. You’ll have to deal with crates hidden behind geometry. You’ll have to find secret “!” blocks. You’ll have to avoid breaking certain crates until later in the level so you can backtrack to other hidden crates you had to skip.
This is a straight up evil level, and I’ll try my best to explain what you need to do for every step. There’s also a Yellow Color Gem in this stage, and reaching it is pretty tricky too. Not nearly as tricky as finding the Hidden Gem, which is almost impossible without a little help from the online community.
More Crash Bandicoot 4 guides:
How To 100% Every Level | All Hidden Gems & Crates Locations Guide | How To Find The Ridiculous WOAH! Meme | WOAH YEAH! Easter Egg Guide | How To Beat All Bosses | Neo Cortex, N. Tropy & More | How To Get All 4 Colored Gems | Blue, Yellow, Green & Red Locations
5-3: Run It Bayou | All Crates & Hidden Gems
To earn 100% on a level, you need to find 80% of all Wumpa Fruit, die no more than 3 times, find the Hidden Gem, and find all crates. These challenges can be completed in any order. If you die more than 3 times while finding all the crates, you can return and earn the last gem later. All gems you’ve unlocked in a level stay unlocked in future replays.
[Easy-To-Miss] 2/272: Right at the start of the level. Bounce off the TNT crate and hit a hidden crate above.
4/272: And the two crate to the right.
[Easy-To-Miss] 10/272: There are 6 insanely easy-to-miss crates right at the start. There’s 2 down the left step, 2 down the right step, and 2 final crates down the left step — hit them all before activating the red “!” crate.
16/272: Below, hit the “!” crate to make 6 crates appear. These are on a timer, so smash them before they disappear.
Yellow Color Gem: Don’t get on the jetboard! Instead, slide-jump onto the ledge on the right. Jump the crates and reach the moving platform. Bounce off the stack of four crates to reach the Yellow Gem high above.
29/272: Destoy all the crates on the way to / from the Yellow Color Gem.
39/272: On the jetboard, destroy the floating crates and the red “!” crates along the path. Just don’t destroy the line of crates right before the end of the track! This count ends with the checkpoint crate.
[Easy-To-Miss] 52/272: Use the line of crates in the water at the end of the jetboard sequence to backtrack onto the wall and ride a platform backward to a single gold fruit crate. Make sure you don’t break all the boxes so you can get back.
55/272: Smash the 3 crates to the right of the checkpoint.
63/272: Continue to break crates along the main path until you reach a red “!” crate.
66/272: Activate the red “!” crate and single-jump the barrels to reach the the 3 crates in time.
[Bonus Room] 88/272: Don’t activate the “!” switch to destroy the fruit crate underneath. Then hit the TNT around the red “!” switch so you can backtrack and destroy the floating crates in time. Use a spin-attack. The rest is straightforward.
105/272: Smash all the crates up to the checkpoint near the second jetboard. There are lots of crates around, so clear them out.
Hidden Gem: Before the second jetboard, look to the right for a barrel. There’s a well-hidden “!” block behind the barrel. Hit it and backtrack toward the water — there’s a hidden path of metal crates on the far right.
130/272: All found in the second jetboard section. Make sure to grab them all — including the red “!” crates.
- [Easy-To-Miss] 130/272: While on the second jetboard, reach the third area (second jump) and look in the lower-right corner.
140/272: Destroy all these crates before boarding the bayou boat.
153/272: At the start of the riverboat sequence, you’ll destroy 1 crate and clear a wall of TNT.
210/272: The rest of the riverboat sequence will net this many crates. Destroy the bounce block (it’s a fake, there’s nothing up there) and set off all the TNT. Duck instead of sliding to make the rest easier.
219/272: Smash all the crates before the third jetboard. Make sure to bounce off the TNT crate to reach the high crate above it.
247/272: Destroy all the crates on the third jetboard sequence. Die if you miss any — the trickiest are at the start, during the downhill part. Turn around and ride against the stream to give yourself more control to get these. The rest you’ll be able to backtrack slightly to pick up.
272/272: Hit the Nitro detonator to complete your collection.
